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Supplies of Rare Earth Elements Exhausted By 2017
tomhudson writes "While we bemoan the current oil crisis, I ran across an editorial that led me to research a more immediate threat. Ramped-up production of flat-panel displays means the material to make them will be 'extinct' by 2017. This goes for other electronics as well. Quoting: 'The element gallium is in very short supply and the world may well run out of it in just a few years. Indium is threatened too, says Armin Reller, a materials chemist at Germany's University of Augsburg. He estimates that our planet's stock of indium will last no more than another decade. All the hafnium will be gone by 2017 also, and another twenty years will see the extinction of zinc. Even copper is an endangered item, since worldwide demand for it is likely to exceed available supplies by the end of the present century.' More links at the journal entry."
Apparently Gallium isn't a Rare Earth Element.
Actually, neither is Hafnium, Indium, Zinc or Copper. Does the article have any connection to the rare earth elements at all?
that depends how much do you rely on goods that travel by ship on salt water?
Zinc anodes are used as an corrosion point for salt water. So Instead of eating the steel hulls in the ships Zinc anodes take the damage. On salt water boats they have to be replaced annually or more.
without zinc world wide shipping will come to a halt a decade later.
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
Copper is in no danger of being depleted, and probably none of the other elements listed. About 3 years ago, copper was barely $1 per pound, and most copper mines around here (S. Arizona) could operate at that price. In fact they could operate at about $0.40 per pound, albeit they would just be hanging on financially. Today, the price of copper is about $3.50 to $4.00 per pound, and they can't pull the stuff out of the ground fast enough. This has cause a couple of things to happen: Old mines are expanding, and new mines are opening up or being proposed. Eventually, this will probably lead to the price of copper to go back down as supply will catch up to demand.
T'ain't necessarily so. Are we running out of Aluminium? Al works just fine as a sacrifical anode.
Have a look here for starters...
Political language
Zinc is old-tech for an anode.
The Army Corps of Engineers (at a lab I used to work at) invented a Ceramic Anode.
A 20oz Ceramic anode does the job of a 50lb Metalic one, huge-huge improvement.
Read all about it.
http://www.erdc.usace.army.mil/pls/erdcpub/docs/erdc/images/ERDCFactSheet_Product_CeramicAnodes.pdf
It seems that way.
Indium, for example, is more common than silver, and the only reason for the supposed scarcity on the market is that the Chinese mining companies stopped extracting it from their zinc tailings.
I suspect a large proportion of the fear mongering derives from the way mining companies define resources and reserves. The type of exploration required to turn a mineral resource (what miners expect to find) into an ore reserve (what they have proved to be there) is expensive. It doesn't make sense to prove up more ore than is needed for the immediate continuity of the company.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
Do you know what Peak Oil is?
Peak Oil:
"Peak oil is the point in time when the maximum rate of global petroleum extraction is reached, after which the rate of production enters terminal decline."
It's not about depleting all oil reserves but the easily extracted oil reserve. There are reserves you can extract oil from but the cost of extraction will exceed revenue. Not too mention the amount of energy needed to extract the oil will be greater further driving up the cost of extracting the oil.
We've hit Peak Oil. It's a question of where we are on Hubbert's Bell-Curve.
FYI Oil companies have done vast surveys of potential oil reserves. Other than deep sea exploration - all the easily extractable reserves are known.